What is an Open Source CMS?
An open source CMS can be installed free of charge on a Web hosting account. An open source CMS represents a viable option for non-profit organizations, educational institutions, and anyone who wants to make a website but who may have limited technical expertise or financial resources.
There are a variety of options out there for developing a site using an open source CMS, and Drupal is one of the most popular (see Figure 1.1).
Figure 1.1. Some popular open source CMS options.
Drupal is increasingly used on sites ranging from the high-profile commercial site of Fedex.com to independent non-profit sites such as rgbgreen.org.
To review, the traditional alternative to a CMS-based website is to painstakingly create individual files for each page in a website, which requires technical knowledge for anyone who wants to add content. It takes more time, and there’s more room for error.
But the magic of a CMS-based site is that you can log in and add content, just like a blog or when you’re writing an email. When you log in, you’re accessing the “back end,” which gives you direct access to the software that makes your website run. Drupal takes care of just about everything for you, including creating new files and keeping track of them. There are different levels of access; if users just need to add an article, you can give them just that level of permission.
Modules
Open source CMS systems come with a number of modules built in, and there are hundreds of modules that people around the world have created that can be downloaded for free to add functionality to a CMS-based website (see Figure 1.2).
Figure 1.2. CMS modules.
Themes
Another feature of an open source CMS is that you can use templates (also known as themes) to control the design of the website.
Before CMS, you had to manually create graphics and adjust the design of a website, either hiring a graphic designer or learning how to do graphic design yourself. But CMS templates and themes allow you to try flexible, “pre-created designs,” which you can also customize. Just as with modules, Drupal comes with several built-in themes, but there are hundreds of themes that you can download and use.
Figure 1.3 shows the back end of Drupal, “behind the scenes,” logged in as Administrator, and looking at the Themes section. You can see a variety of themes, and a particular theme called Acquia Marina, that was tested on www.rgbgreen.org (see Figure 1.3).
Flexibility
Drupal gives you a lot of flexibility in the way you arrange elements on a website page. Drupal is very modular. In Figure 1.4, we are logged into the back end of Drupal, looking at a screen that allows you to rearrange “blocks.” The way you position these blocks affects the way the site looks.
Figure 1.4. Drag-and-drop functionality makes it easier to change the layout of a website.
In Figure 1.5, you can see how a block called Green News Google has been dragged into the top position, and if you look, you’ll see the news “block” at the top left-hand side of the site. This block could just as easily have been dragged into position at the bottom of the left-hand side, or to the right-hand side, and so on.
Figure 1.5. This figure corresponds to Figure 1.4. It shows how rearranging a block affects the layout “out front” on the website.
It would be difficult to have this kind of flexibility in a program like Microsoft Word or Open Office, creating separate files for every page in a website, inserting the graphics, trying to position things, and trying to make every page look consistent. Thousands of professional Web designers use programs like Dreamweaver to make websites, but the larger the website becomes, the more time consuming it is to maintain.
Drupal and other open source CMS programs are not perfect. There are issues to learn about, just like any other piece of software, but open source CMS especially shines for situations where there is a need to create an online community. And the current conventional wisdom is that the best way to approach just about any kind of website is to set the goal of developing or reaching an online community, to engage them, and to grow.
Pros and Cons
There are a variety of approaches to making a website: manual, and the three CMS alternatives: commercial, open source, and free. Each has its pros and cons.
In general, the greater degree of control you want over design, the more likely it is you’ll want to create a website manually. But there is also the question of sustainability, and this is where it can make sense to consider an open source CMS, or even a free CMS.
Manual: A website can be created manually, using HTML code and tools like Dreamweaver and Photoshop. The majority of websites on the Internet are created manually, and people pay monthly hosting fees to have accounts at a place like Hostgator, where they upload their files. Often the most likely entity to have a manually created website is a business that needs a significant degree of customization, in terms of how the site works, or how the site looks. The advantage of creating a website manually is the degree of customization you can have, and the disadvantage is the amount of work it can take to create and maintain, and the technical skills required. The other disadvantage is that the more complex a website becomes, the more difficult it is to do manually.
Commercial CMS: There are a lot of commercial CMS systems out there. They came about primarily to make it easier for businesses to handle the complex logistics of large websites. They also were designed to help solve the problem of involving nontechnical people in adding content to a website. And they especially help when a company needs to have a website in a different language, or multiple languages, which could be a very complex task if you were to try to do it manually. So a CMS is designed to reduce complexity. The advantage of a commercial CMS is that the systems are very powerful and mature. Also, they are backed by a company—that is, specialized staff who can provide dedicated support. The disadvantage of commercial CMS systems is mainly the cost, and one disadvantage can be that they are tied to a company, which can be bought, or go out of business, or change its policies and prices, and so on.
Open Source CMS: Open source CMS systems came about as software developers wanted to have alternatives to closed, proprietary commercial systems. Just like Open Office is a free alternative to Microsoft Office, open source systems are an alternative to commercial ones. The advantages include the fact that there are no licensing fees or purchase fees, and the power has rivaled that of the best commercial systems. Major high-profile websites have been developed using open source systems like Drupal—fedex.com, economist.com, etc. Another advantage of open source CMS is the developer community; there’s an entire community of software developers that create new modules. The disadvantage of open source CMS is that it is not managed, which means that you’re on your own. There is a developer community, and books like this one, but there’s not necessarily a company behind it. (Acquia would be an example of an open source CMS company that helps with CMS.) Open source systems require administration and maintenance, like Windows or Mac OS. There are updates on security, etc., and it’s doable, but there are hurdles. It can end up being easier to maintain than a manual website, but if you need a simple website, you might not necessarily need all the power that Drupal can provide.
Free CMS: For some people, free CMS can provide an alternative. Free CMS systems might also provide a starting point for planning/developing content, so that when you outgrow it, you can move on to an open source CMS system. Free CMS systems might include systems like Blogger (www.blogger.com), or Google Sites (www.google.com/sites), and basically all you do is log in. They are free, no technical expertise is required, and there’s nothing to maintain. Their capability is increasing, and for some, it may simply be more sustainable, meaning less technical hassle and no monthly fees. The advantages include the ease of use and the fact they are free. The disadvantage would be that there are some limitations in customization.
My general recommendation is to start with free CMS, especially if you’re a beginner, and to use it as a tool for planning, experimenting, and building confidence. Then at the same time, you can explore a system like Drupal and “make the switch” as soon as you’re ready. And you may find, that in some cases, you might end up using a free tool, and in other cases, you might end up using Drupal.